visit

See also: visít

English

Etymology

From Middle English visiten, from Old French visiter, from Latin vīsitō, frequentative of vīsō (“behold, survey”), from videō (“see”). Cognate with Old Saxon wīsōn (“to visit, afflict”), archaic German weisen (“to visit, afflict”). Displaced native Old English sēċan (“to visit”) and sōcn (“a visit”).

Pronunciation
  • IPA(key): /ˈvɪzɪt/
  • Audio (US)(file)
  • Rhymes: -ɪzɪt
  • Hyphenation: vis‧it

Verb

visit (third-person singular simple present visits, present participle visiting, simple past and past participle visited)

  1. (transitive) To habitually go to (someone in distress, sickness etc.) to comfort them. (Now generally merged into later senses, below.) [from 13th c.]
  2. (transitive, intransitive) To go and meet (a person) as an act of friendliness or sociability. [from 14th c.]
    She decided to visit her grandparents for Christmas.
  3. (transitive) Of God: to appear to (someone) to comfort, bless, or chastise or punish them. (Now generally merged into later senses, below.) [from 13th c.]
  4. (transitive, now rare) To punish, to inflict harm upon (someone or something). [from 14th c.]
  5. (transitive) Of a sickness, misfortune etc.: to afflict (someone). [from 14th c.]
    • 1890, James George Frazer, The Golden Bough:
      There used to be a sharp contest as to where the effigy was to be made, for the people thought that the house from which it was carried forth would not be visited with death that year.
  6. (transitive) To inflict punishment, vengeance for (an offense) on or upon someone. [from 14th c.]
    • 2007 September 25, Bungie, Halo 3, Microsoft Game Studios, Xbox 360, level/area: Terminal Six (Legendary):
      05-032 was right about one thing: there is only one way to defeat the enemy, and that is to visit utter annihilation on it.
    • 2011 December 2, John Mullan, The Guardian:
      If this were an Ibsen play, we would be thinking of the sins of one generation being visited upon another, he said.
  7. (transitive) To go to (a shrine, temple etc.) for worship. (Now generally merged into later senses, below.) [from 14th c.]
  8. (transitive) To go to (a place) for pleasure, on an errand, etc. [from 15th c.]
    • 1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter XIX, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC:
      Nothing was too small to receive attention, if a supervising eye could suggest improvements likely to conduce to the common welfare. Mr. Gordon Burnage, for instance, personally visited dust-bins and back premises, accompanied by a sort of village bailiff, going his round like a commanding officer doing billets.
    • 2018, VOA Learning English > China's Melting Glacier Brings Visitors, Adds to Climate Concerns‎:
      Each year, millions of people visit the 4,570-meter-high Baishui Glacier in southern China.

Conjugation
Conjugation of visit
infinitive (to) visit
present tense past tense
1st-person singular visit visited
2nd-person singular visit, visitest† visited, visitedst†
3rd-person singular visits, visiteth† visited
plural visit
subjunctive visit visited
imperative visit —
participles visiting visited

†Archaic or obsolete.

Synonyms

Derived terms

Translations
to inflict — see inflict
to avenge — see avenge

Noun

visit (plural visits)

  1. A single act of visiting.
    Next time you're in Manchester, give me a visit.
    We paid a quick visit to James on the way up to Scotland.
    • 1899, Stephen Crane, chapter 1, in Twelve O'Clock:
      There was some laughter, and Roddle was left free to expand his ideas on the periodic visits of cowboys to the town. “Mason Rickets, he had ten big punkins a-sittin' in front of his store, an' them fellers from the Upside-down-F ranch shot 'em up […].”
  2. (medicine, insurance) A meeting with a doctor at their surgery or the doctor's at one's home.

Derived terms

Translations
The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.

Latin

Verb

vīsit

  1. third-person singular present/perfect active indicative of vīsō
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